


Seek, and Ye Shall Find

by WizardGlick



Category: Welcome to Hell - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Coming of Age, Concussions, Friendship, M/M, Necromancy, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:07:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27076219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WizardGlick/pseuds/WizardGlick
Summary: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you."Jonathan does not want to kill himself. Jonathan does not want to lose Sock. Jonathan endeavors to solve this problem by learning the art of necromancy and raising Sock from the dead.Sock isn't so sure he deserves it.
Relationships: Jonathan Combs & Napoleon Maxwell Sowachowski | Sock, Jonathan Combs/Napoleon Maxwell Sowachowski | Sock
Comments: 32
Kudos: 45





	1. 1- Eurydice Panicking, Orpheus Concussed,

**Author's Note:**

> Well, if you made it here after that god-awful summary, thank you for trusting me.  
> I hope you'll stick around for the whole ride, because I'm really excited about this fic! :)
> 
> I was going to call this fic "Jonathan Combs the Necromancer" as a shout-out to the series Johannes Cabal the Necromancer but I decided the joke wasn't worth it, because if you haven't heard of the books I just look like an idiot who's bad at titles skdhfdzd
> 
> Chapter title is kind of a crappy reference to Les Mis (chapter "Orestes Sober and Pylades drunk") and a much less crappy reference to the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice. Because y'know. Necromancy. Claiming a life back from the Underworld. Let's hope Jonathan fares better than poor Orpheus.

Jonathan sighed and kicked at the bright green turf beneath his feet. The last thing he wanted to do on his last day of Junior year was to play flag football in a sweat-stained red penny dredged up from the depths of the ball closet, but he had no choice. The faculty had decided this would be a fun last-day treat for the students and he was locked in.

Jonathan watched his teammates prepare for the kickoff and tried to ignore the dread pooling in his stomach. He just had to survive, that was all.

The game started. Jonathan jogged half-heartedly after the mob of football players and wrestlers dominating the field, mostly trying to keep out of their way.

“Aw, come on, Combs,” Sock ribbed him. “Show me some effort.”

“Yeah, right.” Jonathan side-stepped an errant teammate to avoid getting trampled. “These guys are out for blood.”

Sock floated up a little higher to better survey the field. “They’re not even playing by the rules!”

“There  _ are _ no rules in high school flag football.” Jonathan dodged another teammate and nearly tripped over his own feet.

Then the football caught him in the chest with a gentle thump. He caught it on instinct and looked up in dawning terror at the mob of jocks charging at him.

Sock whooped in delight. “Go, Jonathan!”

Jonathan was too busy running for his life to say anything back. He sprinted for the goalpost driven by the primal instinct to  _ get away. _

He didn’t really process what happened next. The post loomed in his vision. Something, presumably a member of the opposing team, collided with his back and he fell forward. For a split second, his body lit up with pain, and then everything went black.

A lot of things happened after that, framed by agony and the sound of Sock having a spectacular panic attack. The football field melted into the interior of an ambulance melted into the ER.

When reality hit, it landed like a clap of thunder in his brain. “I’m okay!” he said to the room at large. Fluorescent lights beamed down on him and it clicked that he was in a hospital room.

“They’re not admitting you, if that’s what you mean,” his mom said, tilting her head at him.

“Oh,” said Jonathan. He looked around and realized that Sock was nowhere to be seen. His stomach dropped with the sudden idea that maybe Sock really  _ had _ been a hallucination, as he’d considered so many times before, and something about his head injury had corrected whatever chemical misfire had caused him to dream up Sock in the first place.

“What’s wrong, honey?” His mom stood up and walked over to him. “Are you in pain?”

He  _ was _ , but the dull throbbing that echoed through his skull was not half as distressing as the idea of losing Sock. “N-no,” he said, fighting to keep his voice even. He couldn’t break down. Not here. “I want to go home.”

“Soon,” his mom promised.

Jonathan nodded and slipped into a pensive silence as he tried to knit his memories together while simultaneously not freaking out about Sock’s absence. It was a frustrating endeavor. The last thing he remembered clearly was the thump of the football hitting his chest. Then there was a gap followed by a lot of blurry memories of various medical professionals asking him questions and a doctor telling his mom that Jonathan had a severe concussion.

“I want to go home,” Jonathan said.

“I know, honey,” his mom said in a tone of measured patience that Jonathan didn’t really understand.

“Hey, mom?”

“Yes, baby?”

“What happened? I remember being on the football field, and then…” He looked at her hopefully.

She bristled. “From what I was told, one of the other boys tackled you and you hit your head on the goalpost.”

“Oh.” Jonathan wished she would keep talking, because thoughts of Sock poured in whenever it was silent. “I want to go home.”

His mom looked at him, but he couldn’t read her expression. “We will, Jonathan. Soon.”

-

He made it through the drive home without losing it and even managed to eat most of the fast food his mom bought him. When he got inside, he locked himself in his room with a mumbled excuse about being tired, and grit his teeth against the well of despair that had been building in his chest.

“Sock?” he pleaded into the empty air of his room. His voice hitched. “Sock?”

Sock did not appear. Jonathan swallowed hard but couldn’t stop the tears that spilled down his cheeks. Crying made his headache worse. Furious with himself, he scrubbed at his eyes but the tears wouldn’t stop. Jonathan kicked off his shoes and crawled into bed.

-

“Jonathan?” a voice whispered.

Jonathan opened his eyes, but didn’t sit up. The room was dark. His headache had receded some, but it was still difficult to concentrate. What had woken him?

Someone sighed and Jonathan closed his eyes again. If his mom was checking in on him in the middle of the night, he didn’t want to worry her by letting her know he was awake.

Then the voice said, “I understand if you don’t want to talk, but I just wanted to come back and…”

Jonathan didn’t wait for the rest of the sentence. He sat up too fast and had to catch himself to keep from folding in half. His head swam and silver stars sparkled in his vision. “You’re here!”

“You’re happy to see me?” Sock, glowing a gentle green in the darkness, floated down so he was at eye level with Jonathan. “You really  _ do  _ have a head injury.”

Jonathan couldn’t even pretend to be annoyed. “I thought you were gone forever. I thought-- I thought maybe you were a hallucination and, and--”

“And that cracking your head open on a metal pole cured you?” Sock wasn’t smiling. “That stuff only happens in cartoons. Are you  _ okay _ ?”

Tears welled up in Jonathan’s eyes. “I thought i’d never see you again.”

“Okay, you’re freaking me out. What the heck happened to you?”

Jonathan wiped his eyes. “I have a concussion.” He glanced over and saw that his mom had put the care instructions from the hospital on his nightstand (along with a glass of water, a sleeve of saltines, and two Advil).

Sock followed his gaze and floated over to examine the paper. “That’s not surprising. You hit that pole really hard.”

“Mm.” Jonathan grabbed the sleeve of saltines and tore into it.

“Wow,” Sock said, still gazing down at the paper. “You got  _ got _ .”

“Hm?” Jonathan said around a mouthful of saltines.

“You’re dizzy, you’re unfocused, you’re emotional…”

Jonathan was too busy shoving saltines into his mouth to respond, except to flip Sock the bird.

“What?” Sock said. “I’m just reading the checklist!” He floated back to the bed. “I’m so glad you’re not dead. For a second there, I thought…” He didn’t finish the sentence.

“Why did you leave?” Jonathan asked. “I thought  _ you _ were dead.”

Sock tugged sheepishly at his scarf. “I was, um… Well, I didn’t know what was gonna happen to you and I thought, you know, if you dropped dead that I should check in with my boss.”

Jonathan leaned it. Sock didn’t talk much about Hell and Jonathan had never asked. “For your next assignment,” Jonathan said. It wasn’t a question.

“Uhhh,” said Sock. He pulled harder at his scarf. “Well, no. You’re  _ it _ , Jonathan. If I can’t get you to kill yourself, I’m fired.”

“Oh.” jonathan was quiet for a moment while he processed everything Sock had just told him. “Oh, I get it.”

“What?”

“Because you’re a demon from Hell, I get it.”

To Jonathan’s surprise, Sock didn’t laugh. If anything, he looked a little hysterical. “It’s not a pun!”

Jonathan’s head throbbed in a sudden explosion of pain that made him squeeze his eyes shut. “I think I need to go back to sleep.”

Sock nodded. “The care sheet says you’ll need a lot of rest.”

“You’ll be here when I wake up, right?” Jonathan didn’t want to take his eyes off Sock. “You won’t leave again?”

“I’ll be here, Jonathan,” Sock said. “I’m sorry I scared you.”

Jonathan lay back and down and pulled the covers up. “Me too. I’m sorry I scared you.”

“Good night, Jonathan.”

“Good night, Sock.”

-

Jonathan’s mom woke him the next morning before she left for work. Jonathan didn’t bother sitting up, and barely even opened his eyes.

He didn’t wake properly until the summer sun found its way through the cracks in his blinds and painted his eyelids red.

This triggered a gentle but persistent ache in his forehead that he couldn’t ignore no matter how hard he tried. Eventually he gave up and rolled over toward his night stand, where he promptly spilled water all over himself trying to take the painkillers without sitting up.

Somewhere out of his view, Sock snickered. “Sorry, is it mean to laugh?”

Jonathan mumbled something that was supposed to be “I don’t care” and hauled himself out of bed to go look for breakfast.

Sock followed him, a glowing green in his peripheral vision.

Jonathan was pleased to find that his head was clearer than it had been yesterday, although that wasn’t saying much.

“Your mom left you some food in the fridge,” Sock said. “Since you didn’t read the note she left you.”

“Neat.” Jonathan grabbed the plate and stared at it.

“Microwave?” Sock prompted.

“Huh?”

“It’s spaghetti. Are you going to eat it cold?”

“Oh.” Jonathan stuck the plate in the microwave. “Thanks.”

“So you’re not feeling better?” Sock asked.

“I am, actually.”

“Oh.” Sock bobbed a little in the air. “Do you want to talk about last night?”

“Last night?” Jonathan frowned. The memory came into slow focus. The microwave beeped.

“Don’t you remember?” Sock asked.

“I remember,” Jonathan said, hating himself for the blush that crawled across his cheeks.

“I just didn’t think you liked me,” Sock said. “I thought I annoyed you.”

“You do,” Jonathan said, his gaze fixed on the countertop. “Do you want to go watch TV?”

“You’re not supposed to eat in the living room.”

“I’m not supposed to  _ make a mess _ in the living room. Come on.” Jonathan grabbed a fork from the silverware drawer and walked to the living room.

“Is this your way of telling me to stop talking?” Sock asked.

Jonathan grabbed the remote off the coffee table and turned on the TV. “Yes. But since I’m feeling generous, I’ll let you choose what we watch.” He started flipping through channels, his gaze bouncing between Sock and the TV.

"Ooh!" Sock said, his face lighting up. "Is that Frankenstein?"

Jonathan stared at the screen and tried to make sense of what was happening. The light made his eyes hurt. "I don't know." He tilted his head back and closed his eyes.

"I think it is!" The green light beaming into Jonathan's shifted down slightly as Sock settled beside him on the couch.

"I thought Frankenstein was an old movie," Jonathan said, not opening his eyes. "You know, Hammer horror or whatever."

"This is the Hallmark adaptation," Sock said. "It's  _ way _ more accurate to the book."

Jonathan furrowed his brow. "I didn't know you liked reading."

"I don't. I liked Frankenstein, though. I had to read it for one of my English classes."

"That's cool." Jonathan slipped into silence. Dimly, he thought he remembered the doctor saying something about not watching TV, but it slipped away when he tried to focus on the details.

"Aren't you going to eat?" Sock asked.

"Oh, right." Jonathan glanced up at the TV and another stab of pain lanced through his head. He leaned forward to grab his plate off the coffee table and something occurred to him. "Do I have a bruise?"

"Uh, yeah." Sock glanced at him and gestured to his own forehead. "You haven't looked in the mirror yet?"

"No."

"It's  _ huge _ . I'm surprised your mom didn't tell you to ice it."

"I mean, I pretty much passed right out as soon as I got home."

"Well," said Sock. "Maybe ice it."

"Later."

Jonathan kept his attention off the TV as he ate, instead watching all the little microexpressions that crossed Sock's face as  _ he _ watched.

Sock was the expressive sort by nature, and Jonathan didn't miss how his face lit up at certain scenes.

It was hard for rational thoughts to cut through the haze in Jonathan's head, but he could have sworn that Sock smiled at the wrong moments, when the actors on the screen were distressed and crying. But that didn't make sense.

Jonathan set his plate back on the coffee table and leaned back, closing his eyes. His mind wandered, guided gently by the audio of Frankenstein playing on the TV.

Was it such a stretch, that it was possible to make life from death? Sock was proof that the afterlife existed in some capacity, and it necessarily followed that humans had souls. Perhaps it was impossible to sew body parts together to create a new consciousness, but… Maybe there was a way to reunite the body with the soul.

These macabre thoughts danced in Jonathan's head as he sat there in a half-doze. Wasn't there a line from Hamlet about this? More things in Heaven and Earth, something like that.

Jonathan, perhaps out of stubbornness, had not allowed himself to delve into the deeper implications of Sock's existence. If he was being honest, the idea of Heaven and Hell being real scared the shit out of him. But maybe he was too tired or maybe the concussion had scrambled his brain worse than he'd thought, because the idea was suddenly  _ fascinating _ .

If demons were real and Hell was real, what  _ else  _ was real?

Jonathan's eyes snapped open. "Sock."

"Hm?" Sock didn't look away from the TV. Jonathan muted it.

"What if… I mean…"

Sock just stared at him. His eyes were so  _ big _ , so searching. Jonathan could get lost in them if he let himself. (He never let himself).

"What if I raised you from the dead?"

Sock's eyebrows shot up. "What?"

Jonathan did not trust himself to articulate his thought process in his current mental state, so he didn't try. "I'm going to look into it. I'm going to raise you from the dead so I don't have to kill myself and you don't have to get fired and we can be together."

"Do you really think that's possible?" Sock asked, his voice unusually thready. He almost sounded  _ scared. _

"I do." Jonathan nodded emphatically but stopped short when the motion caused pain to ring out behind his forehead. "I'm going to do it, Sock. I'm going to raise you from the dead."

"You're not doing  _ anything _ until the doctors clear you," Sock said. "Go get some ice for your head, okay?"

"Fine," Jonathan said. "But I'm serious. I'm going to do it."

"Sure," Sock said. He swallowed hard and fixed his gaze back on the TV.

Jonathan hesitated before going back to the kitchen. He'd thought Sock would be happy to hear that Jonathan wanted him around.

It had to be the concussion making him confused, he decided. He would have to wait until he was better to do anything major. But he  _ was _ going to do it, consequences be damned. Sock was the best friend he'd ever had and Jonathan wasn't about to lose him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I don't have a concrete update schedule in mind but I'm hoping to be at least consistent with my updates haha  
> Concussed!Jonathan is super fun to write. Sometimes it takes a traumatic brain injury for you to get in touch with your emotions, and that's valid


	2. Love, the Likes of Which You've Never Seen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is a quote from Frankenstein haha see what I did there
> 
> Note: this fic takes place nebulously around the 2005-2010 range. W2H came out in 2013 apparently??? But it just feels so "mid-2000s" to me. God, anyway. The timeline isn't suuuper important, but I wanted to contextualize some minor stuff like the family computer in the living room and the fact that Jonathan doesn't have a smart phone

Unfortunately for Jonathan, his grand plan stalled at the station. His mom wouldn't let him leave until the doctors cleared him, and his brain didn't seem to process the information gleaned from abortive searches on the family computer.

He was just going to have to  _ wait. _

"What a waste of a summer," Jonathan said, throwing a ball of paired socks at his open dresser drawer.

"Like you had plans anyway," Sock said. He was lying spread eagle on Jonathan's bed, the blankets glowing green where his body intersected them.

"I do  _ now. _ " Jonathan folded another pair of socks and lobbed them at the drawer. "When are you gonna talk to your boss?"

"Listen," Sock started. Jonathan let out his irritation in the form of a massive sigh. "I will!" Sock continued. "Probably. Maybe."

"I don't see why it's so hard," Jonathan huffed, fighting the urge to cross his arms over his chest. He still had a laundry to put away, after all.

"It's scary!" Sock sat up and started to toy with the hem of his skirt. "I don't even know what he is."

"Is it not obvious?" Jonathan gestured at Sock. "You're a demon, you work for the De--"

"He doesn't go by that," Sock said hurriedly, looking around as though worried Jonathan might have summoned him.

"Whatever." Jonathan folded a pair of boxers and set them aside. "You said you'd talk to him." It was hard to tell whether the anger in his voice really belonged to him, or if it was just another symptom rearing its ugly head. The brain fog was hard enough to contend with and it was a small mercy he had only cried once in front of Sock. He didn't need irrationality clouding his judgement, even if it was easier to just be mad.

Sock was quiet for a moment, and Jonathan folded a few pairs of sweatpants in a huff. Laundry was the  _ worst _ .

"I did just think of something," Sock said hesitantly. "When I first started, he told me he owns my soul."

The irritation faded away in an instant and Jonathan had to fight not to smile too wide. "He said that?"

"Yeah."

"I  _ knew _ it!" Just as Jonathan had suspected, souls were real.

Sock smiled back at him, and Jonathan's motivation to restore him to life seemed to double in an instant.

He finished putting his laundry away and put his mom's away too, just to be nice, while Sock followed him around talking about whatever crossed his mind.

"What would you be doing right now," Jonathan interrupted, throwing himself down on his mom's bed, "if you had never killed yourself?"

Sock matched Jonathan's pose and hovered over him so that they were face-to-face, and Jonathan nearly went cross-eyed trying to keep Sock in focus. "I haven't really thought about it."

"Come on," Jonathan said. "It's summer break. What did you usually do?"

"I guess I'd be packing for vacation? My parents liked to travel."

"Man, I wonder what  _ they're _ doing right now," Jonathan said. He regretted it instantly, but it was too late to take it back. He sat up, pushing through Sock.

Sock said, "Oh, um…"

"Sorry," Jonathan said. "I didn't mean-- We don't have to talk about them."

"Oh. No, it's fine." Jonathan glanced back, puzzled. Sock seemed more embarrassed than anything. "I'm sure they're fine."

Jonathan frowned as something unpleasant dawned on him. "When I bring you back, would you… Would you want to go back to them? Somehow?"

"No!" Sock said a little too quickly. "No."

"Shitty parents?" Jonathan asked.

"Kill yourself," Sock said.

"Huh?"

"Sorry, I just-- I realized I hadn't said it today."

Jonathan raised his eyebrows. "Do you have a quota?"

"Nooo…" Sock said slowly. 

Jonathan closed his eyes. Besides the laundry, he hadn't really done much, but he was worn out just the same. In pieces, it occurred to him that he had given away far too much of himself far too quickly with no promise of recompense. "Sock, do you like me?"

"Yes," Sock said from somewhere above him. him.

"Really, though. Do you want out? Or would you rather I just killed myself so you could move on?"

"I like you, Jonathan. It scares me how much I like you. And… It makes me sad."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't think you'd like me this much if you knew me when I was alive. I don't think you'd like me at all."

"But I  _ do _ like you, Sock. I want you to be happy. With me."

Sock didn't answer. In the still and the quiet, Jonathan was too sleepy to pursue one anyway. If Sock didn't want to talk, he didn't have to.

\--

"I did it," Sock said.

Jonathan shifted with a crinkle of paper and glanced at the door. "You talked to him?" he whispered, not wanting to draw the attention of an MA or doctor by talking too loudly.

"I did."

"And?"

Sock sighed. "He couldn't really say either way. He said he  _ thinks _ souls have gone missing from Hell."

"'Thinks'?" Jonathan repeated. "You mean he doesn't  _ know _ ?"

"It's kind of a mess down there," Sock said, shrugging.

Jonathan took a breath to continue, but a polite knock at the door heralding the arrival of his doctor made him go quiet.

It was hard to focus on the examination, cursory though it was. He answered all the questions and nodded through the mandatory lecture about exercising and eating right, bypassed the reception desk, and met his mom in the lobby.

"So I'm free?" he said, pulling his hoodie back on despite the bright sunlight peeking in through the windows. "I can have my summer back?"

"I'm not going to keep you on house arrest if the doctor cleared you."

Jonathan sighed in relief. The dark bruise adorning his brow had faded to a pale green color that he almost couldn't see unless he was looking for it. "Thank god."

"Please be careful, though. Try not to get yourself killed."

"Oh, like it was  _ my _ fault," Jonathan huffed.

His mom started to lead him back to the parking lot. "I'm just saying I want you to be careful, Jonathan."

Annoyed, he rolled his eyes and did not respond.

He did say goodbye when she dropped him off a home before heading back to work.

"Tell me  _ everything _ ," he said to Sock as soon as they were both inside.

"I kind of already did?" Sock said. "Sometimes souls go missing in Hell and logically, there's not really anywhere else  _ for _ them to go."

Jonathan considered this. "So there's no 'lost socks' dimension?"

"What?"

"You know, like when you lose your socks in the dryer. There's a little hidden space where they all end up."

"Oh," said Sock. "I mean, I don't know? We have agency, you know. I think it might be  _ worse _ to end up trapped in some random dimension with a bunch of strangers 

"So no 'lost sock' dimension."

"If you think about it," Sock said with a grin that made Jonathan's chest feel tight, " _ this _ is the 'lost Sock' dimension."

"This is the ' _ found _ Sock' dimension," Jonathan corrected him. "Come on."

He led Sock over to the computer where it stood on its designated desk in the corner of the living room. "We have some researching to do."

"Oh, yeah?" Sock leaned over Jonathan's shoulder and watched him type 'necromancy' into Google. "Hard-hitting research."

"Well, I have to start  _ somewhere _ ." Jonathan scrolled through the results until he had so many tabs open he started to feel anxious about reading them all. One by one, he skimmed them. "Okay, lotta definitions of necromancy."

"Please don't try to divine the future from my bones," Sock said from somewhere behind Jonathan.

Jonathan tilted his head over the backrest to look at Sock upside-down. "No guarantees."

"That's creepy."

"Says the demon who's been stalking me for a year." Jonathan returned his attention to the computer and clicked on a few more tabs. "Yeah, it's just a whole bunch of book recommendations. Be right back." He fetched a notebook from his room and started to scribble down a list of book titles.

"So you're really committing to this, huh?" Sock asked, peering over Jonathan's shoulder.

"Well, yeah. Was that not obvious?"

"I thought…" Sock tugged at the ear flaps on his hat. "I mean, the concussion messed you up pretty bad, and I thought that maybe you would, I dunno, forget? Change your mind?"

Jonathan sighed. This was his chance to deny his feelings, to back out, to agree with Sock and let everything go back to normal. They could pretend that none of this had ever happened and Jonathan could go back to pretending Sock annoyed him.

Jonathan glanced down at the list of books he'd copied down in what used to be his trigonometry notebook and decided, maybe for the first time ever, to not take the easy way out.

"I meant what I said, Sock. I'm doing this."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyway, this chapter moved me to take a screwdriver and dismantle part of my dryer trying to find my lost socks. I didn't find any and had a harrowing moment where the panel I removed wouldn't line up properly again so I could screw it back on snd I thought I had fucked up and broken everything.  
> I got the panel back on, but my loose socks are still missing >:(
> 
> I was worried that not enough *stuff* happened in this chapter but I didn't want it to get too long so uhhh. Welcome to the slowburn, i guess


	3. Death, Therefore, Is Nothing To Us

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Howdy! I'm back!  
> As I said, I took November off for NaNoWriMo anD ACTUALLY FINISHED??? Then I took a bit of December off to recover from November, and now I'm back  
> This chapter is fairly short because I rushed it because I didn't want y'all to think I had abandoned the fic
> 
> Content Warnings: None?? I did take some liberties with witchcraft but I'll thank you to suspend your disbelief and not be pedantic about correcting me

Jonathan's school binder was rapidly becoming a compendium for all things necromantic in nature, filled with copies taken from library books on the occult.

In the cool, quiet corner of the library he had chosen, he uncapped a highlighter so he could pick out relevant lines from a passage on blessing chalk.

"I'm bored," Sock said, breaking the hush of the library for Jonathan alone.

"Go look at the chameleon." Jonathan nodded his head toward the glass tank in the children's section, only just visible from his seat.

"I already  _ looked _ at the chameleon." Sock hovered over so he could read over Jonathan's shoulder. "You need a demon to bless the chalk?"

"Yeah," Jonathan said, setting his highlighter down. "Do you know of any?"

"I'll ask around."

"Thanks." He lowered his head again, hoping that Sock would take the hint, but it didn't work.

"Is it really  _ blessing _ if it's a demon doing it?" Sock asked.

"I don't know, Sock. You just have the say the incant--"

"Shouldn't it be  _ damning  _ the chalk?" Sock interrupted.

Jonathan laughed despite himself. "Will you damn my chalk for me?"

"I'll damn whatever you want," Sock giggled.

Jonathan buried his face in his sleeve to muffle his laughter. It really wasn't that funny, but something about trying  _ not _ to laugh only made him laugh harder. He managed to put a stop to it when a librarian trundled by pushing a book cart and gave him a curious look.

"I really need to focus," he mumbled to Sock, not daring to look him in the eye in case he started laughing again.

"So focus on  _ me."  _ Sock flipped over the top of Jonathan's head so he was hovering just above the surface of the table flat on his back. He peered up into Jonathan's eyes and smiled.

Even though Sock was upside-down and the smile looked eerie, Jonathan's treacherous heart did a flip and he tried to focus on the text beneath Sock's head. "Seriously, we're kind of on a time crunch here."

Sock stuck out his tongue. "Could you at least read it out loud?"

"Alright, but I'm going to need you to move."

"No way, I'm see-through!"

Jonathan rolled his eyes and leaned in. "' _ To draw the… sacred…'  _ I really can't read it." He refocused his eyes and realized he was nose-to-nose with Sock. "You're in my way."

"But I like it here," Sock said.

"I don't care." Jonathan planted his elbow on the table, simultaneously annoyed and endeared. He decided to put his foot down. "Seriously, though. Move."

Sock sank through the table and reappeared in the seat diagonal from Jonathan. "Read to me?"

"I was trying." Jonathan waited for Sock to say something, but Sock only gave him a saccharine smile and inclined his head expectantly. Jonathan took a breath and began to read softly.

He didn't really care if the other denizens of the library thought he was crazy or weird, but he couldn't afford to be disruptive and get himself kicked out. He  _ needed _ to get this done before summer ended.

When he was done muddling through the passage, Jonathan looked at Sock and absentmindedly ran his fingers over the bruise on his forehead. "Well," he said.

To his irritation, Sock used this as a springboard order to dive into another unrelated tangent. "Is it weird to you that all this," he gestured to the binder, "is  _ real _ ?"

"No," Jonathan said, electing not to elaborate in the vain hopes of getting Sock to stop talking.

"Really? You're not bothered? Magic is real! I'm a demon from Hell!"

Jonathan raised his eyebrows. "That's not exactly a revelation."

"Well, yeah, but--" Sock floundered. "So how are you going to hide all this from your mom, huh? I don't think she's going to approve of you doing rituals in the kitchen."

"I'll get there when I get there."

"But what about-- Um…"

"Sock. I'm trying to work."

Sock tugged on the flaps of his hat, looking strangely agitated. "Sorry." He got up and floated toward the chameleon tank.

Jonathan let him go. The fact was, reading was boring and talking to Sock was infinitely more fun. If he wasn't going to sit and be quiet, then it was better for him to go away.

Sighing, Jonathan turned the page to the photocopy he had taken from a book on the occult.

He hadn't expected to find all the answers conveniently bound in a dusty old grimoire, but neither had he anticipated the sheer  _ work _ of sorting through various books and articles, piecing together a Frankenstein's monster of a necromancy ritual. Worse still, his head still ached and his mind wandered when he tried to concentrate for too long. The doctor had assured him this was normal, but it was still maddening.

Still, despite the setbacks, the ritual was coming along nicely (at least on paper). He had a list of materials, none of which were too difficult to obtain, and he didn't have to worry about summoning a demon and binding it to his will. That was the tricky part. The rest appeared to be rote memorization: drawing the right shapes and speaking the right words.

There was also the small matter of locating Sock's body, but Jonathan had decided not to think about that because it was distracting.

"You're smiling," Sock said, popping his head up through the table.

Jonathan jumped, only just managing to stifle his cry of surprise behind closed lips. "Hi."

Sock continued as though nothing had happened, "Is it going well?"

Sock, Jonathan noticed, was  _ not _ smiling. He floated the rest of the way through the table, fidgeting all the while with the hem of his ugly sweater-vest. Jonathan narrowed his eyes. "It's going way better than I thought it would, actually. Demon-summoning is the hard part."

"Great," Sock said with an unconvincing smile.

Jonathan blinked hard and rubbed his eyes. Maybe he was just seeing things wrong or interpreting them incorrectly. Or maybe Sock was just nervous "I don't know if you want to talk about it, but I do have a question for you."

"I'm supposed to be the ominous one," Sock said, crossing his arms.

"Where's your body?"

Sock answered without thought or hesitation. "Whispering Creek Cemetery, in the middle left."

"Oh," Jonathan said, drawing back a bit. "I meant, like, the town. Are you sure? Did you-- I mean, are you  _ sure _ ?"

Sock said, "If you were shrunk down to the size of a chameleon, do you think you could beat one in a fight?"

"Huh?" Jonathan glanced at the chameleon tank, then back at Sock. "If you don't want to talk about it right now, you can just say so."

Sock shrugged and fixed him with a goofy smile, and Jonathan's irritation melted away.

Jonathan looked away and continued, "That was kind of a lot to just spring on you. We can talk about it when you're ready."

"Great," Sock said, grinning like fool's gold.

Jonathan went back to his reading, his subconscious ticking away in the background.

Something was definitely up with Sock, but Jonathan didn't have the time or the patience to address it anytime soon.

He wrote it in on his schedule between ' _ practice ritual' _ and ' _ locate Sock's body': 'talk to Sock _ .'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for any weird typos; I write on my phone and autocorrect works in mysterious ways  
> Also, not that it matters, but I decided to set this fic in 2009
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	4. Latus Alterum

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! I think this is the part where I update you on what happened in my life between chapters so that you can form a one-sided attachment to the idea of me, buuuut... I don't remember. The whole month is a blur. Christmas happened, I guess, and New Years.  
> For posterity: I got my first dose of the COVID vaccine! That's about it.
> 
> Content Warnings: animal (bird) death (it's not overly gory or anything); blood (nosebleed, no violence)

' _ Talk to Sock' _ kept falling lower and lower on Jonathan's list of priorities. The issue wasn't so much the conversation, as Jonathan was sure he could handle anything Sock could throw at him. It was just that the more progress he made toward writing the spell, the less he cared about Sock's little hang-ups and hesitations.

Jonathan circled ' _ talk to Sock' _ and drew an arrow to push it further down his to-do list. Then he set his binder aside and slid it across the beat-up vinyl flooring, far away from the candles.

He'd had to steal some of his mom's tealights from her bathroom. Arranged in a small circle on the kitchen floor, they were a far cry from the white taper candles illustrated in the pages of the demonology book Jonathan had copied, but they'd have to do.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you not to play with fire?" Sock asked as Jonathan lit the first little tealight.

"No." Jonathan put it down and moved onto the next. "Get in the circle."

"You don't have to be so bossy about it," Sock said, but he floated away from the fridge just the same, arranging himself cross-legged in the middle of the candles.

"That was me summoning you."

"Cute."

"Yeah, I'm adorable." Jonathan brandished the flimsy box of Crayola chalk he'd liberated from Dollar General the day before. "Now hurry up and say the words."

Sock squirmed. "I feel stupid."

"It's Latin," Jonathan said, feeling his patience slip away as the pilfered tealights flickered. "Latin is cool. Ooh, spooky dead language." He wiggled his fingers for emphasis, hoping to make Sock laugh.

Sock only twisted up his mouth and reached for the chalk. It stayed in his palm long enough for him to bring it into the circle, where it then clattered to the ground.

Jonathan winced, watching the candles gutter. "Will you just do it? Please?"

"Yeah, yeah." Sock screwed up his face in concentration and sounded out the words Jonathan had forced him to memorize. No sooner had he voiced the last syllable did the candles all go out in a five magnificent bursts of flame 

"Fuck!" Jonathan said, jerking backward.

"Tea towel's on fire," Sock said.

Jonathan dived for the oven door, but the decorative linen towel was only smoldering. He patted it with his hands, taking little notice of the heat. "Did it work?"

"No, the candles did that spontaneously."

The sarcasm sounded foreign coming from Sock. Jonathan was quiet for a second too long before picking up the carton of chalk. "It doesn't look any different."

"Except for the glow?"

"What glow?"

Sock gestured at the chalk like that would explain anything. "It's glowing."

"No, it isn't. Are you messing with me?"

"I'm serious!" Sock insisted. "Can you really not see it?"

"No," Jonathan said, closing one eye experimentally. "Weird."

"Your mom isn't gonna be happy."

"About the chalk?"

"The towel!"

"Ah, she won't notice." Jonathan gathered up the smoking tealights as calmly as he could with his heart thundering away in his chest. They were still hot and the melted wax sloshed over the sides and spilled over onto his shirt, but he hardly noticed the searing heat.

Sock floated after him in silence while Jonathan went outside to throw the candles away in his neighbor's trash bin. His eyes were far away, his movements jittery.

"What's next on the list, captain?" he asked when Jonathan returned to the kitchen and scooped his binder up off the floor.

Jonathan didn't answer right away. He scratched out ' _ bless chalk'  _ on his to-do list. "Now we test it out." After a half-second's silence, he added "Lieutenant."

Sock burst into laughter and Jonathan had to scrunch up his face to avoid doing the same. "'Lieutenant'?" Sock repeated incredulously.

"I was--" Heat rushed into Jonathan's cheeks. "You called me 'captain,' so I was trying--" Sock continued to laugh, tipping sideways in the air. "What should I call you, then?"

"Well…" Sock calmed down by degrees, wiping tears out of his eyes. "You could call me by my name."

"Sock," Jonathan said.

"Napoleon."

Jonathan felt his eyebrows raise despite himself. "You're kidding."

"Nope."

"Well," said Jonathan. "I see where 'Sock' came from. Makes perfect sense."

"Oh, shut up." Sock grabbed his hat's ear flaps and yanked the whole thing down over his eyes.

Jonathan swallowed down the rush of affection that followed. "Well, I don't know anything about Napoleon's rank, so I think I'll stick with 'Lieutenant.'" He paused and spared his binder only a half-glance. "Is it dumb that I never questioned the idea that your parents named you 'Sock'?"

"So dumb," Sock said. He pulled his hat back up and smiled at Jonathan. "You're dumb."

For a moment, they teetered on the precipice of something. Jonathan focused intently on the way the light reflected on Sock's goggles. They needed to talk, and Sock had opened up voluntarily, made himself vulnerable to Jonathan.

Then a bird hit the kitchen window with a resonating  _ thud _ and Jonathan flinched so hard it made his head spin, and dived for the knife block on wild impulse.

He was out the door into the summer heat before Sock's cry of "what are you  _ doing _ ?!" even registered in his brain.

The knife felt good in his hand; solid and dangerous. He rounded the corner of his house, barely noticing Sock's familiar green glow in his periphery.

"Hey, Freddy Kruger!" Sock said.

Jonathan stopped. "Freddy Kruger didn't use a  _ kitchen knife _ ," he said. Like it mattered.

Between his feet rested a small, brown songbird.

It was still but for the spastic heaving of its chest. Blood oozed out between the feathers on its head.

"Are you…" Sock's voice was scarcely more than a whisper. "Are you going to kill it?"

"I have to test if the ritual works." Jonathan knelt and looked at the helpless little bird.

"Kill it."

"What if it dies on its own?"

"Don't you want to know what it feels like to kill something?" Sock asked.

Jonathan's concentration shattered. He whipped his head around to look at Sock, whose gaze was fixed on the bird. His hand, Jonathan noticed, was curled into a fist. "No." Jonathan shot to his feet and threw the knife down, heedless of the potential danger. "Jesus! No." He shuddered, disgusted with himself. "Sorry, I-- I just got caught up. I swear I'm not turning into a serial killer."

Sock didn't seem to want to look at him. He stared at the bird, his eyes hard, his face unreadable.

"Sorry," Jonathan said, horrified at the way his voice cracked. What had he been thinking? He'd probably scared Sock.

He was reminded suddenly, randomly of Victor Frankenstein, brought down by his own blind ambition. But that was ridiculous. Jonathan knew what he was doing. He was in control.

"It's dead."

"What?"

Sock nodded at the bird where it lay in the dirt. "It stopped breathing."

"Oh," said Jonathan. "Good."

He bent down to retrieve the knife and slid it carefully under the bird, balancing the body on the flat of the blade.

Unfortunately, he had neglected to think through the finer details of his plan, and that was how Jonathan ended up with a nosebleed, a flaming tea towel, and a newly revivified bird flying lopsided circles around his head.

Jonathan's head spun. He stared at the flames, newly aware of the warm wetness on his upper lip. He pressed his fingertips into it and examined the blood, which reflected the light of the fire.

"Hey, genius!" Sock yelped. 

This was enough to stir Jonathan out of his stupor. He snatched up the towel with his bare hands and dropped it in the sink, then turned the tap on full blast.

Blood spattered onto his white t-shirt. He stared at it.

"How cliche." Then his knees gave out.

Overhead, the bird chirped and flitted from wall to wall. Jonathan tilted his head back to look on it and nearly gagged on the blood that slipped down his throat.

"Your mom is gonna flip out if she sees you like this," Sock said.

Jonathan said nothing.

Sock continued, "Are you… you know. Are you okay?"

Jonathan took a moment to self-assess. The shaky feeling was already wearing off. Aside from the cloying taste of blood in his mouth (which was his own fault, really), he felt… fine. "Yeah?" he said. "Weirdly." A moment later, reality came crashing in and he stood up to turn off the sink.

"Will she notice  _ that? _ " Sock asked, gesturing down at the sopping remains of the tea towel. "How about the blood on the rug? And your shirt."

"One thing at a time," Jonathan said. "I gotta get this bird out of here before it shits on something."

He opened the front door and stared expectantly at the bird, which was still peeping pathetically and flying in circles. "It's okay, right?" Sock asked.

"It's probably just disoriented," Jonathan said, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach. How would he know if the bird had come back  _ wrong?  _ "God, this is complicated."

"Hit it with a broom," Sock said.

"What?" Jonathan looked at him. "No."

"You're just gonna leave the door open?"

"I have other problems to deal with." Jonathan went back to the kitchen and scrubbed his face off with the ruined towel.

"What if another bird comes in?"

Jonathan glared at Sock. "Then I'll hit it with a broom." His voice cracked halfway through the sentence and he started to laugh, finally giving into the giddy feeling of triumph. 

He had done it.

He still had work to do, experiments to run, but at least he had a start.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, hope you liked!  
> Find me on Tumblr at OurLordApollo
> 
> As always, feel free to point out any typos or other such weirdness, as I wrote this whole thing on my phone and autocorrect keeps finding innovative ways to make me look like an idiot
> 
> Oh, and I don't speak Latin; per a cursory Google search, "Latus Alterum" means "on the other side" and is often incorrectly written as "Latum Alterum." Thanks, Reddit.


	5. Memento Mori

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops, I really didn't mean to let this fic sit for a month before updating it 🙈🙈 I hope this chapter was worth the wait, if you happen to be reading this in real time
> 
> Content warnings: Non-graphic animal death mentions. Again, they're *not* graphic but there are quite a few of them
> 
> Lastly, I just want it on the record that I wish I had outlined and finished this instead of writing and posting chapter-by-chapter but nooo I just had to try it to see what all the fuss was about 🥴 I feel like I'm RP-ing with myself and it's *very* weird

By some miracle, Jonathan's mom not only failed to notice the missing tea towel and persistent smell of smoke, she didn't question his strained silence during dinner or the giddy smiles that flitted across his face when he let his mind wander.

He rode his bike into town the next day and bought a pack of white T-shirts from Kroger to replace the one he'd ruined.

On the way home, he stumbled across a dead raccoon.

Two hours later, he had it hissing and snarling, trapped in the clear plastic bin his mom usually used to store wrapping paper.

"It's gonna suffocate if you don't let it out soon," Sock said conversationally.

Jonathan had grown far too jaded to be startled by Sock's sudden appearances. He glared at him over the wad of sparkly tissue paper he'd shoved against his nose to staunch the flow of blood. "Yeah, I  _ know." _

_ " _ So what, you're gonna kill it?"

_ This _ made Jonathan flinch. Shame washed over him in sickening waves and he turned his head away to stare at the raccoon. "No… I'm not. Listen, Sock, I'm not like that. I'm not gonna go off the rails and become some unhinged murder fiend just because I learned how to undo death."

Sock fidgeted with his hat and didn't seem to want to meet Jonathan's gaze. "You'd better let it out, then."

Well, great. Now Jonathan needed to have  _ two _ big conversations with Sock; one to fix whatever weird hangups Sock had about being resurrected, and one to reassure Sock that he wasn't getting any sick gratification over scraping up roadkill and restoring it to life.

Jonathan just had to be sure he was doing it right.

"You're okay, right?" Sock said suddenly.

Jonathan tore his gaze away from the raccoon. "Huh?"

"With the nosebleeds and everything. You're not, like, slowly killing yourself for my sake?"

"Oh, no." Jonathan pulled the tissue paper away from his face and touched his nose experimentally. "See, it's already stopped bleeding."

"Well,  _ yeah _ , but…"

"I looked it up in my notes, anyway. Apparently using your body as a conduit for magic like this can cause burst capillaries." Sock did not look reassured, so Jonathan decided not to mention the bruising that had appeared on his legs as well.

"What are capillaries?"

"Weren't you paying attention in any of my Bio classes?" Jonathan teased.

Sock blushed, somehow. "I was kinda busy."

"Capillaries are little blood vessels."

"So you're not dying?"

"Nope."

"Oh, good." Sock floated over so that they were nose-to-nose, and all Jonathan could see were Sock's green eyes. "So are you keeping the raccoon as a pet, then?"

"Oh, shit." Jonathan stood up and grabbed the edge of the bin so he could drag it outside, wincing every time it hit a bump.

Sock followed and made commentary. "Sprint to the finish," he said when Jonathan reached the lawn.

"I, um…" Jonathan stared at the handle.

"Oh, relax, it won't bite you."

"How do you know?"

Sock flipped upside down and grinned. "Don't you trust me?"

"Not about this particular thing," Jonathan grumbled. Still, he stuck his hand out and opened the lid.

The raccoon stared, waiting.

"How many tests are you going to do, anyway?" Sock asked, flipping over onto his back. "Maybe you should try it with something bigger. And friendlier. Like a dog."

"Where am I gonna get a dead dog?"

Sock shrugged. "Grab a knife and DIY."

"Sock…" Jonathan drew back, sick shame coursing through him.

"Sorry."

"I really wasn't going to kill that bird, I swear."

Sock rolled over and stared at Jonathan for an uncomfortably long time. "I know," he said finally. "But would it be so bad if you did?"

Jonathan couldn't hold his gaze. He glanced down and noticed that the raccoon had scampered away when he wasn't paying attention."C'mon, you don't need to play devil's advocate."

"So you  _ do _ think it would be that bad?" Sock pushed.

"Yes, Sock, obviously I think animal murder is wrong," Jonathan snapped.

"Yeah," Sock sighed. If Jonathan's outburst had startled him, he didn't show it. If anything, he looked sad. "Listen, I'd better go check in downstairs."

"Speak of the Devil," Jonathan muttered. Sock didn't laugh.

Jonathan put his head down and trudged back inside holding the bin.

If Sock truly didn't want to be resurrected, Jonathan mused as he rinsed raccoon hair down the bathtub drain, then he should have said something. He'd had plenty of opportunities to stop Jonathan.

He dried out the box and started piling wrapping paper back into it, carefully avoiding the bloody tissue paper he'd left on the floor. Sock clearly wasn't going to initiate any sort of conversation and, as much as Jonathan wanted to, he couldn't just ignore Sock's obvious hesitation.

But talking to Sock meant that Sock might back out, and that thought scared Jonathan more than he would  _ ever _ admit.

\--

He'd worked himself into an ugly mood by the time his mom got home from work, and only glared at her when she asked if he wanted to talk.

He sequestered himself away in his room while she went about her routine, blasting music through his headphones so loud that he couldn't focus on the bad thoughts.

His mom insisted that they eat dinner together and he was careful to come down at 6:30 so she didn't have to yell. That was a one-way ticket to having his headphones confiscated and he knew better than to press his luck.

Sock failed to manifest, which Jonathan had anticipated, but the anxiety only made him angrier.

The mounting rage dissipated with dizzying speed at the sound of knocking on the front door. Jonathan swallowed hard and tried not to panic. Had one of the neighbors seen him with the raccoon?

For a moment, he contemplated fleeing to his room, but then his mom had answered the door and it was too late to do anything anyway--

"Hi, Mrs Combs. Is Jonathan there?"

Jonathan froze halfway between sitting and standing. He'd recognize the voice of Zack Melto just about anywhere, although it was strange hearing him sound so humble, with no note of mocking in his voice.

"Jonathan!" his mom called.

Jonathan came to the door, one hand trailing the wall. He wished he had his hoodie to hide in, but it was too hot to wear it now that summer was in full swing. "Hi…"

Zack handed Jonathan a bouquet of carnations with an 'I'm sorry' card taped to the cellophane. "Um," he said, shifting in place. "I'm sorry I tackled you so hard."

Jonathan blinked in surprise. He hadn't realized it was Zack who had knocked him out. "Oh, uh. It's okay, I guess?" Jonathan said. At a loss, he stared at his mom, but she wasn't looking back.

"And I'm sorry it took me so long to apologize, but I was at football camp and my dad said that was more important."

"Uh-huh. Well."

"Um."

"That's sweet of you, Zack," Jonathan's mom finally cut in. "Say hi to your parents for me."

"I will, Mrs Combs."

"Bye," Jonathan said. He turned on his heel and walked to his room, ignoring the sound of his mom calling after him.

His mind whirled. He barely noticed the crinkle of the flowers under his arm as he paced the length of his closet. Zach had unwittingly solved a problem Jonathan hadn't even realized he'd had.

\--

When Sock showed his face again the next morning, it was like nothing had even happened. He wrinkled his nose at the white carnations wilting on Jonathan's dresser. "Who died?"

"Me, obviously," Jonathan said, pulling on his favorite Valhalla's Soundbox T-shirt. "Can't you tell?"

"I think I'd notice if you died." Sock floated over to examine the card.  _ "Did _ someone die?"

"No," Jonathan said. He opened his door, yawning, and made for the kitchen. "Zack Melto came over to apologize for nearly killing me."

"Why do I know that name?" Sock asked, tugging at the hem of his vest.

"He and his dumb jock friends like to push me around during P.E."

"Ah," Sock said. "So, you think it wasn't an accident?"

"What, him trying to turn my brain into a Jackson Pollock painting? Actually, I do."

"Why's that?"

"He's honestly one of the nicer ones." Jonathan shrugged and pulled a carton of orange juice out of the fridge. "He only pushes me when other people are looking, and never that hard."

"Yeah, he sounds lovely."

Jonathan just shrugged and carried on digging around in the fridge. "So," he said, forcing himself to adopt a casual tone. "I think I'm ready."

"To get married?" Sock asked, a nervous waver in his voice.

"Yes, Sock." Jonathan turned around to make sure Sock could see him rolling his eyes. Sock smiled, guileless, and Jonathan sighed. "To raise you from the dead."

"Cool," said Sock, like Jonathan had just shown him a mildly impressive skateboard trick.

"So where's the Whispering whatever Cemetery?" Sock opened his mouth to answer, but Jonathan cut him off. "Actually, wait 'til I get on the computer so I can look it up on MapQuest."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A wild Zack appears! My friends and I have built a whole personality for him in our heads out of a deep desire for him to be a sweetheart, but I know in my soul he's probably kind of a bully  
> Thanks for reading! I'd love to tell you that I'll have the next chapter out before another month passes, but tragically i do not control the executive (dys)function. Feel free to point out typos/other weirdness  
> Find me on Tumblr as OurLordApollo 😁


	6. Memento Vitae

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's mento iwness innit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyo! Thanks for checking in. This story is wrapping up way faster than I expected (I went in with no plan other than "haha necromancy")  
> Thanks for sticking around this long! 
> 
> Content Warnings: talk of murder and suicide, both seriously and as a joke; suggestive humor

After an awkward email exchange with Zack, Jonathan finally had his alibi in place. It was laughably flimsy, but it was also the only thing he could think of.

He would have liked to have run it by Sock first, but Sock was hardly around these days. He would pop up from time to time, offer a half-hearted "kill yourself," then vanish again without so much as looking Jonathan in the eye.

Alarm bells blared in Jonathan's head; he wasn't stupid and he knew that this was directly related to his plan to raise Sock. But Jonathan was also a consummate procrastinator (all his teachers would agree). He could have the conversation with Sock's freshly-resurrected body for all he cared.

So Jonathan made his plans with Zack, stuffed tea candles and enchanted chalk into his duffel bag, rounded up the last of his birthday money, and walked to the Greyhound station. Alone.

Everything from his age to the way he hid inside his hoodie despite the heat should have alerted people that Jonathan was doing something wrong, but no one seemed to care. No one looked at him or questioned him. He was invisible.

It was almost unsettling. Jonathan sat down in his seat with his duffel bag in his lap and suppressed the urge to shudder. Was this how Sock felt all the time? It was creepy, but strangely freeing. Jonathan nearly laughed, his heart stuttering in his chest. He suddenly wanted to grab his things and run back home as fast as he could.

"So this is it, huh?" Green light tinted the ugly gray fabric stretched over the seats.

Jonathan smiled despite himself. "This is it."

"No going back now."

"We haven't left yet," Jonathan pointed out. "I could still bail."

Sock considered this. "Do you want to?"

"No." Jonathan studied Sock's face, eyes roving over the freckles and acne scars, his dark eyelashes and the gentle curve of his lower lip. "Do you want me to?"

"I…" said Sock.

The bus doors closed and they began to roll out of the depot. One last spasm of panic gripped Jonathan's heart. He clutched at the lifeline that was Sock's presence. "Sock?"

"No!" Sock shouted, turning his face away. "I want to be with you, Jonathan. Everything you've been doing, I want it. I know how hard you've been working and… I know it hurts you. I've seen the bruises."

"But I wanted to," Jonathan said, frowning. He wished he could take Sock's chin in his hand so they could look into each other's eye again. "I don't understand."

Sock sniffed but did not wipe at his eyes. "I don't deserve it, Jonathan. I don't deserve any of this. I don't deserve  _ you." _

"What do you mean?" Jonathan asked. He'd never known Sock to struggle with low self-esteem, but… Then again, he  _ had _ killed himself. Jonathan had never thought to worry over a  _ demon's _ mental health. Maybe he should have.

"I don't want to tell you," Sock said in a small, quivering voice. "I waited… I knew you weren't gonna ask, so I waited…"

"Whatever it is, we can work it out," Jonathan said. 

"No, we can't." Sock's voice broke and his shoulders shook.

Jonathan reached out. His hand passed through Sock. "What is it?"

"I killed my parents," Sock whispered. "I didn't mean to-- I mean, I  _ did,  _ kind of. I thought about it all the time and then one night I woke up and there was blood everywhere and I had my knife-- I cut their throats and I don't even  _ remember _ it."

"You k--" Jonathan looked around, wary of the other passengers. "In your  _ sleep?" _ Several things slotted into place, pieces of a puzzle he hadn't even realized he was putting together. He wrapped his arms around himself and shivered.

"I know," Sock said, his face still downcast. "I used to kill animals all the time for fun, and then I started thinking about people." Sock's voice was high-pitched and desperate, each word practically tripping over the last. "I thought about how I would kill someone, how I would get away with it. I thought about it all the time. And then I did it. "

"In your sleep," Jonathan repeated, strangely fixated on that point. "Were you, like, mad at them?"

"No…" Sock said, finally looking up. His cheeks were streaked with tears, but no more joined them as he studied Jonathan's face. "They're my  _ parents _ . I didn't… I mean, I  _ did _ want to, but I didn't  _ want _ to want to."

"So you  _ didn't _ want to… do what you did?"

Sock tilted his head. "What?"

"When you pictured, you know," Jonathan lowered his voice, "hurting someone, did you picture your parents?"

"Nooo…" Sock said slowly.

"Hm," said Jonathan. "I just don't see how you can be held responsible for something you did in your sleep."

Sock stared at him, wide-eyed. "Are you serious? Jonathan, I'm a murderer."

"I mean, are you though?"

"Yes!"

Jonathan shrugged. He felt strangely clear-headed despite the way his heart was hammering in his chest. "I guess you're gonna have to change your name, huh?"

"What?"

"You can't be going around using the name 'Napoleon' now. It's too close to…" He paused. "Huh, I guess I never thought about you needing, like, a whole new identity. I know a guy who can get you a fake ID. We can from there."

"Jonathan!" Sock shouted. Both his hands passed through Jonathan's shoulders with a static tingle.

"What?"

"How are you being so cool about this? I  _ know  _ you. You're a good person with morals and, and…" Sock trailed off.

"Well, yeah," Jonathan said. "And if you'd killed your parents when you were  _ awake _ , then we'd have to have a talk."

"A  _ talk _ ?"

Jonathan sighed and swept his bangs out of his eyes. "I know you, too, Sock. And I know what I want."

"Still?" Sock whispered. "You still want me?"

"Yeah, Sock. I do."

They were quiet for a while after that. Jonathan stared out the window at the freeway and watched the scenery go by. Some absent part of him wondered if he should care more about Sock's confession, but no matter how he looked at it, he couldn't find it in himself to blame Sock. It just wasn't his fault and that was all there was to it.

"I can't wait until I can touch you," he said suddenly, turning away from the window.

"Why?" Sock asked, waggling his eyebrows and shimmying.

"So I can smack you," Jonathan said, heat pouring into his cheeks. "Right upside the head like you deserve." He settled back in his seat and stared at the person seated a few rows ahead of him. "I want to be able to do things with you. When we hang out, you're  _ there _ but it's not the same."

"I get it," Sock said. "It's frustrating not being able to touch things." He paused. "When you raise me, what are we going to be?"

"We're gonna be  _ us _ , Sock," Jonathan said.

"Friends?" Sock asked timidly. "Or…"

"We can figure it out as we go," Jonathan said, the blush not subsiding. He would be lying if he said he hadn't thought about kissing Sock, holding him close. But it was a realm he hadn't fully let himself explore, not wanting to get lost in the fantasy of the impossible. But how to explain that to Sock, who never seemed to hold himself back?

"Oh, you wanna wait 'til marriage, huh?"

"Sock!" Jonathan buried his face in his hands. "I swear to God I'm going to just turn right back around and go home."

"Hey, yeah," Sock said, all traces of playfulness gone from his voice. "Where does your mom think you are right now?"

"I blackmailed Zack into letting me pretend I was spending the weekend at his house."

"Did he ask what you're doing?"

"Yeah. I told him I'm picking up a shipment of cocaine from my contact in the Bahamas."

"You did  _ not." _

"You don't know." Jonathan adjusted his position as much as the confines of his seat would allow. "Can you move somewhere? My neck is getting sore."

"You hate eye contact," Sock said, but he floated over so he could hang upside-down in front of Jonathan. "How long is the trip, anyway?"

"6 hours," Jonathan said, making a point to look in Sock's eyes. "But I don't have to change busses, so that's a plus."

"6  _ hours _ ," Sock groaned, throwing his hands up. "And then 6 hours back?!"

"That's how time works, yes."

"Forget it, I'm not worth it."

It was a joking comment, but it pierced Jonathan's heart like an arrow. "You  _ are  _ worth it."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm a real angel."

"I like you just the way you are. Murderous tendencies and all." After a moment's silence, Jonathan said, "Are you going to miss any of this?"

"What do you mean?" Sock asked, cooking his head.

Jonathan gestured broadly at him. "You know, floating? Going through walls?" That kinda thing."

"Oh," said Sock. He twisted up his mouth, thinking. "Not really. I could do backflips before I, y'know, lost my body."

"That's not  _ quite _ the same thing."

"Floating really isn't that special. Especially not compared to, like, living. I guess it's nice not having to go to school."

Jonathan considered this. "Maybe I  _ will _ kill myself."

"Plot twist."

Jonathan laughed quietly and rested his head against the window. It wasn't exactly comfortable, with the way the bus rattled and shook over every imperfection in the road's surface, but Jonathan didn't mind.

He lost track of time in the blur of the passing scenery, towns and houses and farmland. It occurred to him once or twice to put his headphones on and dig his iPod out of his pocket, but he decided to keep his ears open in case Sock wanted his attention.

This decision was vindicated some time later, when traffic thinned and the bus picked up speed and Jonathan's forehead rattled against the windowpane so severely he thought he might bruise.

"Are you awake?" Sock whispered, barely audible over the ambient noise.

Jonathan did not raise his head. "Yeah."

"I just realized," Sock said. "I never…" He sighed and Jonathan swore he could feel Sock's breath on his neck. "Thank you, Jonathan."

There was nothing Jonathan could say to that. 'You're welcome' felt painfully underwhelming; they both knew 'no problem' was a lie. Instead he reached out blindly for Sock's hand, knowing full well that he would miss, and Sock would find him anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> So I do consider this the end of the story, like, emotionally we've pretty much resolved the tension  
> But I *did* promise you necromancy and I'd hate to leave you without payoff (I'm not a huge fan of ambiguous endings), so I will be adding one final chapter probably very soon if not, like, later today
> 
> Tumblr: OurLordApollo


	7. Vita Ante Acta

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AAAAHHH

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it!  
> Thank you so much for reading this far 💜💜💜💜💜
> 
> Content Warnings: just general graveyard-y morbid stuff

It was a clear night, cloudless but for a few gray wisps that moved quickly with the breeze. Jonathan crept along the row of headstones dragging the shovel he'd stolen from Walmart behind him, his duffel bag bouncing against his hip.

He'd spent most of the day wandering around Sock's hometown and his legs ached, though he knew the real work had hardly begun.

" _ What _ was the last name, again?" he whispered.

Sock hesitated before answering. "Sowachowski."

"Right." Jonathan heaved a sigh and kept walking, craning his neck to try to read the headstones and grave markers. "And you have  _ no _ idea where you're buried?"

"No…" Sock said. "I kind of… Dug my own graves before? So I just assumed…"

"What?" Jonathan said, a little too loud. "Never mind, we can talk about that later." He swiped his bangs out of his face and huffed. "Be nice if there was a directory or something. God forbid you come to the cemetery and actually find what you're looking for."

"I do have good news," Sock said.

"Oh, yeah?"

"Most graves aren't dug 6 feet deep these days."

"Good. I was worried about that."

"What was your plan?"

Jonathan nodded at the shovel. "Dig."

"So you really didn't think this through at all."

Jonathan felt himself blush. "Don't know if you noticed, I was a little bit busy reconstructing a necromancy ritual from scratch. So no, maybe I didn't schedule everything else down to--"

"Stop," Sock interrupted. "This is it."

Jonathan turned. He looked down at the headstone where it lay, gleaming and solid in the moonlight. "Napoleon Maxwell Sowachowski," he read, feeling the weight of Sock's name in his mouth.

Then he began to dig.

He dug until sweat ran down his face, until blisters opened up on his hands and started to bleed, until the tip of the shovel struck plastic. He recoiled and paused, dropping the shovel and bracing his palms against his knees.

"The fuck is that?"

Sock examined it. "Oh, it's a burial vault."

"A what?"

"They put it over the coffin so the ground doesn't collapse when the wood starts to decay."

"Ah," said Jonathan.

"So like," Sock said, "you really,  _ really _ didn't think this through."

"Oh, like it's common knowledge that they put the body in a box, then put that box in a  _ different _ box, then bury the body-in-a-box-in-a-box." Jonathan picked up the shovel and started to dig again, hammering at the plastic to see if it would break. "Maybe I should have grabbed a hand axe or something."

Despite everything, Sock laughed. "Oh, I'd love to see that. Big, bad lumberjack Combs." The shovel broke through the plastic with a crunch and Sock stopped laughing. "You're going to ruin that shovel."

"It's not like I paid for it." Jonathan rammed it into the wood of the coffin, over and over until his ears sang with the sound of it.

Eventually, something gave. He fell to his knees to examine the hole he had made. "Think you can squeeze through that?"

"Maybe," Sock said, barely glancing at it.

"Don't worry," Jonathan said. "There's a cover. You can't, like,  _ see _ anything."

Sock looked into the grave. "Yeah, I think that will work."

"Okay." Jonathan started digging through his duffel bag with shaking hands. He was  _ sure _ someone had noticed him and called the cops by now. He certainly hadn't made an effort to be subtle in his attempts to crack open the coffin. And in the unlikely event that no one had heard him, the lights from the tea candles would certainly draw someone's attention. He had to work fast.

He could hear his own breath, loud and frantic in his ears, feel the nervous nausea pooling in his gut. This was it.  _ This was it. _

He nearly dropped the lighter as he lit up the candles and incense, hummed the tones and said the words. The chalk was harder to work with, as it didn't want to leave marks on the wet grass, and he eventually had to improvise by crumbling it into pieces and drawing the sigils in powder.

There was no time to check in with Sock. He had to do this  _ now _ or he might never do it, and was that siren he heard or his own imagination? Were the stars going out above his head? Was the world turning much too fast?

He said the final word in a frantic, choked whisper, blood heavy in his mouth.

Then everything went black.

"Jonathan?" Sock whispered.

Hands on his shoulders. Taste of blood. Smoke in the air.

Jonathan rolled over and coughed until he could breathe. Half-dried blood pulled at the skin around his lips and he could already feel new bruises blossoming on his arms and legs.

"Jonathan?" Sock whispered, squeezing his arm.

Jonathan shot up and wrapped his arms around Sock. "It worked!"

"You did it," Sock said, his breath ghosting over Jonathan's ear. "We should go."

Jonathan didn't want to let go. Sock felt so  _ right _ in his arms, like he belonged there, like they were made for each other. He pulled back so he could look Sock in the face and was immediately distracted by the austere black suit that hung off Sock's frame and clashed with the vibrant colors of his hat. "They buried you in  _ that _ ?"

Jonathan watched, enamored, as blood flowed into Sock's cheeks. "Shut up," he said. And he grabbed Jonathan by the collar, heedless of the blood, and kissed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked it! Find me on Tumblr as OurLordApollo if you ever want to talk about W2H or any other thing 😊


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